Friday the 13th - Yellowfin, Sailfish and Dorado in Loreto

It is not news that it has been a more than respectable year for dorado at Loreto. As the season winds down, however, the dorado seem to be getting a little bigger, sailfish are gorging on the abundant bait in the area and now yellowfin tuna have made the first appearance on the scene since Spring. As the Fall action is turning on outside Mag Bay my attention has been mostly on the Pacific banks for the past month or so, but with relatives visiting I focused back on my own back yard this week and on Friday had one of the best fishing days of year. I launched with my brother and nephew at the marina at first light and headed out to the canyon, about 40 miles northeast of town. When we arrived there was a seiner in the area with a helicopter spotter, and no other sportfishing boats. We trolled for about an hour before we found yellowfin under porpoise and diving birds. On our first pass with two marlin feathers and a cedar plug we had a triple hook-up and landed two. We switched out the feathers for more cedar plugs and chased small breaking schools of tuna until the bite subsided a couple of hours later. While the action was on I called in two other boats that were fishing closer to shore to come out and share the bounty. We ended up with 11 yellowfin about 20 pounds. When the tuna action died we headed west to a high spot about 30 miles north of Loreto. On the high spot sailfish and dorado, mostly sailfish, were going crazy. Over the next 3 + hours we caught 3 dorado, around 30 lbs., and caught and released 10 sailfish. We had double and triple hook-ups on sailfish and lost a lot more than we caught. Since I am here year round and my brother and nephew only get a taste of this a week or two a year I drove the boat and handled the gaff and releases. I was breaking in a new Avet LX 6/3, however, and after 6 or 7 sails decided to see how it felt on a big fish. We took in the other rods and I took the new Calstar/LX in hand. Within less than 5 minutes I teased up a sail which we released 10 minutes later. That was the kind of day it was. (the LX 6/3 did fine, by the way) Our final count for the day was 11 yellowfin, 10 sailfish and 3 dorado.
Attached is a picture of the dorado and tuna.

[Edited on 10-15-2006 by bill erhardt]

One of the sails being released.

Nice Day

Thanks for the Report..

A Day to remember!. Thanks for sharing.